


She is Something to Behold, Elegant and Bold

by vulcanicity



Category: The West Wing
Genre: F/M, Post-Series, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-02
Updated: 2015-06-02
Packaged: 2018-04-02 14:04:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4062724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vulcanicity/pseuds/vulcanicity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The story of how Danny Concannon fell in love with CJ Cregg. Spoilers for the whole show.</p>
            </blockquote>





	She is Something to Behold, Elegant and Bold

**Author's Note:**

> This story chronicles that way that Danny fell in love with CJ, and some of the things that happened over the whole show.
> 
> Title comes from the some "Georgia" by Vance Joy. The lyrics pretty much sum up how I feel about CJ and I'd listen to it whilst you read ;)

Danny remembers the first time he met CJ Cregg like it’s yesterday. It was in the Spring of 1998, and no one thinks that Jed Bartlet is going to be the Democratic nominee for President - everyone is sure it’s going to be John Hoynes - but his editor sends him up to New Hampshire anyway, to see what he thinks.

 

There’s not a lot of news coming out of the White House, since it’s an election year, so Danny doesn’t really mind. He loves New Hampshire, too - not just the pancakes and maple syrup, but the excitement of the politics in the Granite State - and so he’s on the first plane he can get.

 

Not many reporters are covering Bartlet’s campaign yet, and they’re at some town hall with the Governor talking about some economic idea that Danny doesn’t really care about when Josh introduces him to CJ.

 

She’s all long legs and curly hair, awkward and unsure yet somehow projecting confidence. She’s beautiful. Danny takes a greater interest in the campaign after they meet; he persuades his editor to let him stay with the Bartlet campaign as they travel to Iowa and South Carolina.

 

Bartlet For America is gaining momentum, and Danny is gaining a rapport with CJ and the other’s - Sam and Leo, certainly, not so much Toby, but he’s not sure Toby likes anyone - and then they win the Illinois primary. The press are wandering around, watching as the staff celebrate, and Danny watches CJ from a distance. She looks so happy and her smile is the brightest in the room. There’s dancing and hugging and lots of laughter, and everyone is happy (apart from Josh, poor, poor Josh), but Danny only has eyes for CJ.

 

He follows them to the Democratic National Convention, knowing that Bartlet is going to get the nomination. The press presence around the campaign has grown considerably, and the convention is a whole new level of crazy. He loves the convention, loves watching Jed Bartlet speak, loves the way CJ is so much more comfortable now, a few months in, and happily laughs and jokes with the press as she spins the outcome of the convention.

 

The exhaustion of the campaign hits him just as hard as it hits the Bartlet For America staffers, as they travel around the country. As he writes from the road about the campaign, their momentum, the faux pas and beautiful oratory, the silly mistakes and brilliant moments, he slowly realises that he’s falling for CJ Cregg. It’s not like they have a personal relationship, and they’re not really any closer than she is with any of the other press, but he can feel it.

 

At first it was just lust, lust for a beautiful, funny and incredibly smart woman (he isn’t just attracted to her body; her brains are as wonderful as her body), but it’s changed. He’s only known her for a few months, but it feels like forever. From a distance, he falls deeply in love with CJ Cregg.

 

It’s election night, and they finally call the results at almost 2am. Danny’s exhausted, but he’s pleased. He has to work, of course, but he gives himself a while to celebrate. He’s spent a lot of time with these people - the President-Elect, Abbey, Leo, Toby, Josh, Sam and of course, CJ - and he really does believe that they’ll be good for his country. He’s proud to have voted for Bartlet (less so for the bottom half of the ticket, but what can you do). There’s a lot of champagne flowing, and the staff are celebrating in the ballroom, mingling with the press and the other party attendees. He drags CJ onto the dance floor, leads her for a few moments, until Josh drags her away. He goes to bed that night with a smile on his face.

 

It’s Inauguration day, and he’s watched President-Elect Bartlet become President Bartlet. He goes to one of the Inaugural ball’s with the rest of the press corps, because he can’t follow CJ around like a puppy forever. There’s no news tonight, just booze and music and dancing. He catches sight of her as the President and his new Senior Staff make their way into the ball he’s attending - their fifth ball; he wonders how pissed Josh is - and _goddamn_ , if she isn’t the most stunning woman in the room. Her gown is dark blue, tight in the all the right places, with a plunging neckline. It’s pretty much the best night of his life, because he’s never seen her in a ball gown before, and he feels his heart sink as she dances the night away with a man he’s never seen before.

 

They’re settling into the White House, and Danny watches CJ control the Press Room from her podium, make mincemeat of his colleagues, use her brains and wit to distract them from the bad things, highlighting the wins of the new administration. He watches in awe, his love for her growing every day.

 

He flirts and she flirts back and there are kisses (the best kisses he’s ever had, because it’s CJ) and he buys her Gail, and their little goldfish sits on her desk, a symbol of whatever it is their relationship is. It’s easy and fun and breaks up the daily news cycle.

 

Not all of the days are good. The shooting at Rosslyn is one of the worst nights of his life. It’s hours after the shooting before he even knows that she’s alive and uninjured. He’s spent plenty of time with Josh and knowing that he and the President have been shot hurts, but he’s so relieved that it isn’t CJ in an Operating Room that he breathes a sigh of relief he hadn’t realised he’d been holding from the moment the bullets stopped flying. She briefs, and it’s clear she’s shaken up, but she’s _alive_.

 

They survive, they make it through the shooting and come out the other side, which at the time Danny wasn’t sure was possible. Josh is recovering, and then it’s the midterms. Most of the people around CJ don’t notice that she’s struggling, but Danny does because he’s spent the last few years watching from the fourth row of the briefing room, and she’s just not the same person she was.

 

Danny gets a call whilst they’re in Portland; his editor has a new assignment for him - foreign correspondent - and Danny doesn’t hesitate to take it. He will miss CJ, will miss her smile and her casual flirting and the hot, open-mouthed kisses, but he has to get away. He can’t waste his life on a woman who is too busy living her professional life to have a personal life.

 

The MS scandal breaks, and he’s in Kenya. He watches the interview with the President and Abbey. He watches the press conference. He’s proud to have voted for the President, and even more than that he’s proud of the way CJ has publicly coped with this insanity. She must feel betrayed, because she trusts Jed Bartlet like a father, but she does a wonderful job of keeping her feelings at bay. He wishes he was there, wishes he could comfort her and take care of her and tell her everything is going to be OK.

 

When the President is censured by Congress (oh, if he could set fire to the Capitol, he would), he’s working on a story in Thailand, and there’s only sketchy coverage of the events. He catches as many of CJ’s briefings as he can, but it’s difficult. Thinking about her still makes his heart skip a beat. He doesn’t think of her constantly, but somehow his mind always wanders back to her.

 

Then there’s the re-election campaign, and Danny posts his postal vote from a remote island in the Pacific that’s so small he can walk from coast to coast in half an hour. He thinks of the celebrations they must be having the White House, and he spends a good few days missing the life he once had, where he followed CJ and everything she did. It’s been more than a year since he’s seen her, and yet she’s still on his mind. That’s when he admits that maybe, just maybe, she’s the one that he’ll never get over; the one he wants to be with forever.

 

“Ho, ho, ho” He’s back for a story that will make the Bartlet administration look pretty terrible, but it still feels good to be back in the White House. He bugs her about the Abdul Shareef story, but it’s difficult to keep at it because he really just wants to ask her out for dinner - off the record - and kiss her goodnight. He sticks around Washington for a few months, working on the story, and then it’s five days until the Inauguration, and he’s really fucking pissed off. He doesn’t want to piss CJ off, and it’s not his fault that his researcher and editor went behind his back to write that article, but he’s so angry.

 

He goes with Josh, Toby, Charlie and Will to Donna’s apartment and Charlie’s spouting all of this crap about how much he loves Zoey, and Danny just wants to shout “And I love CJ” but he can’t and doesn’t and won’t, because he doesn’t mind the idea of the Press Secretary dating a reporter, but CJ does, and he knows that hasn’t changed over the last few years. He’d rather keep his dignity, and love her from a distance, than make a complete fool of himself.

 

They make it back to the Inaugural balls, and he spots CJ. She’s in red, and she looks beautiful, but Danny keeps his distance, because he knows he really screwed her a few days earlier, so he watches from afar as she sips champagne and dances with Leo and the President, Toby and Josh and Will.

 

The Shareef story keeps him busy, and then he brings it to her and she knows she can’t deny it anymore, not with the evidence he has, but it all gets caught up when Zoey Bartlet gets kidnapped. He’s never been more in awe of CJ than when she gets on that podium, not knowing anything except for the fact that the President of the United States is now just a heartbroken, world-weary father with a kidnapped daughter. She doesn’t sleep for days, hardly leaves the office until Zoey is found, thankfully alive and well. Danny is worried about what Walken will do, and his heart is with the Bartlet’s (because he’s learnt a lot about them over the years, and if there’s one thing that he knows for sure, it’s that Jed Bartlet loves his girls like nothing else in the world), and he’s busy working, but his mind still drifts to CJ at every free moment.

 

She tells him to post the Shareef story, and he does, and then he disappears. Back off into the world of reporting from halfway around the world. He knows he can’t be there, for CJ, because she’s doing everything she can to cling on to hope and happiness and trust in the work of government, and she can’t do that with him around.

 

He leaves for years, and he realises that absence really does make the heart grow fonder. He travels a lot, and writes a lot, and then Leo has a heart attack and CJ becomes Chief of Staff. He prays for Leo (though considering it’s been years since he’s been to Church, he’s not sure if his prayers were a help or a hindrance to Leo’s recovery), and he’s incredibly happy for CJ, but his first thought is _no conflict of interest anymore_. The thought fills his mind for a few days, before he realises that she must be struggling to stay afloat in a job no one ever expected her to have, so he stays in Sweden, watching Toby brief, and hoping beyond hope that CJ is adapting well to a job that he knows in his heart she will be amazing at.

 

The election cycle is working it’s way back to a general election, so his editor persuades him to come. He’s exhausted from travelling the world, so of course he decides to travel around the country instead, working on a couple of House races, follows the Russell and Santos campaigns from a distance. It’s been so long since he’s seen CJ - in person or on a television set - that when he closes his eyes, it’s difficult for him to see a clear image of her face.

 

Toby is fired and Danny wants to punch him in the face for being so stupid, and abandoning CJ in the White House. She’s the only one left - Leo’s running for Vice-President, Josh is doing his damnedest to get Santos into the White House, Sam never returned from California and now Toby is gone, too. He stops reading anything Greg Brock writes.

 

Doug Westin’s battle to win in New Hampshire keeps him in the Granite State for a while, and he hears things about Doug Westin and the Westin’s nanny, things that he wishes he didn’t have to hear. That’s when he decides it’s time to buck up the courage and see CJ again. She strides into the restaurant, looking as beautiful as the first time he met her, all those years ago. His heart is hammering in his chest and there are butterflies in the pit of his stomach. He’s known her nearly eight years, and he’s still in love with her.

 

Dinner doesn’t exactly go as planned, but even in the few minutes they spend together, he can see that she’s changed. All of the terrible things that have happened over the last eight years have changed her. But he’s still crazy for her. Nothing has changed that. She apologises for running out on their first dinner, and then she does it again (though at least they get to eat this time). He turns on the a TV when he gets home, and he understands. He drops her a line, tells her that he’ll be there when she gets out of the White House, and leaves it at that.

 

It’s Election Day and Danny is settled in front of his TV, MSNBC on loud, a beer in one hand and a bag of chips in his lap when he finds out that Leo is dead. It’s one of the worst moments of his life, because as much as Leo didn’t really appreciate having Danny hanging around the White House all the time, they had built up a relationship. His heart breaks for CJ.

 

He leaves an official condolence call, and then he e-mails CJ again. She replies two days later, when everything has calmed down a little and she can’t cope any longer. He lets the Secret Service check out his apartment, and then there’s not really any talking. As much as he’s spent the last eight years pining after her, he never actually thought that he’d get to see CJ naked, get to make love to her, or take away her pain.

 

It’s not just a one night thing, and pretty soon he’s gotten used to waking up next to CJ, albeit at the most ungodly times after only a few hours sleep. Then he asks her if she sees him in her future, and the look on her face makes his heart crumble. She was right when she said she’d be leaving the White House with almost no human skills, and he’s reminded of that as she walks away. He feels like a fool, because he’s been silently in love with her for almost eight years and she clearly doesn’t feel the same way.

 

He goes home and pours a drink, and then another, and he’s pretty drunk when there’s a thunderous knock on his door. The Secret Service check his apartment and she’s standing in front of him, looking more vulnerable than he’s ever seen her look before. It’s clear she’s been crying, and he feels like an idiot. Just because she lacks human skills doesn’t mean she doesn’t love him, it just means she has no idea how to face it.

 

They talk, and neither of them really know what to say. Eventually they end up on the couch, the bottle of Jack Daniels in front of them. CJ is doing most of the drinking, because he doesn’t think he should be plastered tonight. He watches her pour another drink, and he realises he’s done with watching from a distance. He’s sitting inches away from her, and in a few weeks they’re going to move to California together and start a life together. So he decides to tell her: “I’m in love with you, and I have been for years”. He’s got the Dutch courage, that’s for sure, but as soon as he says it, he regrets it, because it sounds kind of creepy and desperate. Luckily for him, CJ doesn’t see it that way. Instead she smiles, leans forward and kisses him softly. “I love you too, Danny”.

 

He heads to LA before the Inauguration, intent on finding them a place to live. She leaves the White House for the final time and that evening she lands at LAX, and as she walks into the Arrivals area, he realises that his dreams have come true. Eight years, dozens of countries, thousands of miles and now they’re togetther, ready to start the rest of their lives together. 


End file.
